Doubles

"There are games in chess won by the same style, same manner, same number of moves and even same moves. There are doubles. I think any chess master has his own experience with these doubles."

- Ljubomir Kavelek, quoted in James Plaskett's, Playing to Win

A while back I wrote about this on my club blog (http://streathambrixtonchess.blogspot.com/2006/10/doubles.html) giving a couple of examples played OTB 18 months apart against the same opponent.

The two games were identical until move 9 and could have become identical again at move 16 had Black played a different move in the second game. Although the position on the board then became different the themes that emerged were very similar in both games.

I thought then - and now - that this is very rare.

Here at RHP I've now completed 20 games and have another half dozen on the go at the moment. So far the longest I've had a game match another exactly is 10 moves - and this despite the fact that the vast majority of my games have started with the same opening system..


I'm wondering if my experience is common or unusual.

Do your games follow similar patterns or do they vary early on?

What's the longest double you've had so far?

I have won with middlegame cheapos on more then one occasion. In fact, I remember a time when I found a line that always won against fritz 5 and kept playing it again and again and I learned the entire game up to checkmate for about 60 moves.

I used to sometimes impress people by playing 1 minute blitz and beating fritz in this manner while they were watching - that was quite good fun.
They just dont seem to make fritzes like that one anymore...

Originally posted by Tyrannosauruschex
I used to sometimes impress people by playing 1 minute blitz and beating fritz in this manner while they were watching ....

Good for you - although I think you maybe wanted that on another thread.

Any doubles during your impressive fritz beatings?

Its probably very common due to the millions of games played and recorded nowadays, for example, I observed a 3 year old girl pushing white pieces around a board whilst a playful cat patted the black pieces, they bore a remarkable similarity to my own playing style and openings..... that being rather poor....

Longest I've found so far is 12 moves: Game 1996288 and Game 1696656. But that's from quite a large selection.

I've lost a piece twice to the same (!) guy OTB with about 4 months between.

Petrov (1948) - Baumanis(me) (1816)

1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 a6 4. Ba4 Nf6 5. 0-0 b5 6. Bb3 Be7 7. Re1 0-0 8. c3 d5 (I don't think there's any other reasonable response if black wants to play for a win) 9. exd5 Nxd5 10. d4 exd4 11. Nxd4 Bb7? (11. ... Nxd4 12. Qxd4 Bb7) 12. Nf5! and black's position collapses, for example 12. ... Nf6 13. Nxe7+ Nxe7 14. Qxe8 Raxe8 15. Rxe7. This is how I played it first time. The second time, after 12. Nf5 I realized that I've blundered away my position and gave up. Both games were rapid chess - 15 min per game for each player.

Originally posted by mtthw
Longest I've found so far is 12 moves: Game 1996288 and Game 1696656. But that's from quite a large selection.

In that same opening I have had games going up to move 20 before taking their own individual ways.

I remember a few years ago in the bundesliga that Luke Mc Shane and Shirov both played the sveshnikov on boards 1 and 2 ( they werent teammates). After the game Shirov accused of Mc Shane of trusting Shirovs opening better than his own.

Originally posted by sannevssr

I remember a few years ago in the bundesliga that Luke Mc Shane and Shirov both played the sveshnikov on boards 1 and 2 ( they werent teammates). After the game Shirov accused of Mc Shane of trusting Shirovs opening better than his own.

I'm sure it's very common at GM level...

when I said it was unusual I was referring to amateurs/patzers such as myself.

I'm sure Shirov and McShane and any other GM who plays the Sveshnikov has doubles that go beyond move 40. ;-)

Originally posted by JonathanB of London
I'm sure it's very common at GM level...

when I said it was unusual I was referring to amateurs/patzers such as myself.

I'm sure Shirov and McShane and any other GM who plays the Sveshnikov has doubles that go beyond move 40. ;-)

Im sure there has, the example I gave stands out , as those games were played at the same time on the same table :-)